Washington Post 'Post Everything' editor apologizes for headline

6/10/14 4:22 PM EDT

The Washington Post’s Post Everything editor Adam Kushner apologized on Tuesday for a headline on a piece about how one way to stop violence against women is to get married that lit up the internet on Tuesday afternoon not along after the paper found itself in hot water over a controversial George Will column.

“One way to end violence against women? Stop taking lovers and get married” read the original headline, with the subheadline: “The data shows that #yessallwomen would be safer hitched to their baby daddies.”

“The headline we originally put on the piece distracted people from taking seriously a raft of social science that the authors discuss. That was my bad.” Kushner tweeted. “Regarding the substance of the piece, we’ve said from the beginning that (Post Everything) is dedicated to publishing a wide range of perspectives about issues in politics and culture.”

After op-ed contributor George Will’s column published on Sunday about how the focus on campus sexual assaults is making “victimhood a coveted status that confers privileges,” many in the media chattering class were shocked the Post would wade into such electrified territory again.

The article, written by University of Virginia’s W. Brad Wilcox and University of Illinois’ Robin Fretwell Wilson, argues that one way to decrease violence against women is to strengthen marriage.

“Married women are notably safer than their unmarried peers, and girls raised in a home with their married father are markedly less likely to be abused or assaulted than children living without their own father,” they wrote.

“Going back to my regimen of reading through old detention reports, because they're less depressing than the Post's full-throated patriarchy,” tweeted The Guardian’s Spencer Ackerman. “Sorry to all the great Post reporters whom that piece is going to detract attention from.”

Not long after the piece went up, Wilcox, one of the authors of the piece, tweeted that he wasn’t happy with the headline and was “working to match (the) title with (the) text.”

The piece’s headline and sub headline have now been changed several times. The sub headline changed to “The data show that #yesallwomen would be safer with fewer boyfriends around their kids” and the headline changed to “One way to end violence against women? Married dads.”

Kushner posted a link to the article on his Facebook with the comment “Uh-oh. (cowers under desk)" though the post has since been edited.

Post Everything was launched earlier this year as a digital opinion and analysis venture, relying on a large network of outside contributors for its content, and promising “to deliver wide-ranging commentary on the big, in-the-moment debates facing Washington, the country and the world," according to the announcement at the time.

Request for comment from The Washington Post, W. Brad Wilcox and Robin Fretwell Wilson were not returned.